life and landscape

Starting point

It’s another bright and clear morning here for my now weekly blogging session. However, the sun has lost it’s warmth now and there’s a distinct bite to the breeze which makes it hard to sit outside and write. Instead I’ve spent a lovely hour or so in some of Sedbergh’s many bookshops, browsing for inspiration.
I’m just at the starting point for a couple of new works I’ve been asked to do. I love this bit of a project. I like most parts of making new pieces, but I really like the initial research phase.

I’ve already got some initial concepts and even some more formed ideas, which would probably keep the client happy, but I want to do something with depth and narrative, and that journey for me starts with a good few solid weeks of research.
Along the way I’ll probably consider and work up more than a few ideas which will either be shelved for a more appropriate occasion, or more than likely never see reality.

original sketch for 'LandPaper' (2008)

I’ve got dozens of non projects. Most I can look back on as just substandard. A few were logistically beyond the opportunity they had to fit and are filed in the maybe some day folder. Very occasionally one gets dusted off and gets realised – as was the case with LawnPaper at Blackwell.

LawnPaper' - final installation (detail). 2010

So now I sit with a pile of books (I still prefer paper stuff sometimes) to see what went before and where I want to go with these. Then it’s off to the canals at the weekend for a bit of pottering and site searching.

I guess the best bit about this phase is that I genuinely have no idea where this project will take me and what I’ll end up doing. At the moment it’s all still a mystery and one day it’ll be amazing…